


Now Was That So Hard?

by littleberd



Category: Castlevania (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, M/M, and dhampires in Adrian's case, between vampires and humans, different soulmate identifyers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-21
Updated: 2017-08-21
Packaged: 2018-12-18 03:59:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,883
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11866233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littleberd/pseuds/littleberd
Summary: "Mama?" a small Adrian Tepes inquires, pulling his mothers sleeve, a silent request for her to bend to bend down and gain her attention."Yes, Adrian dear?" She asks, face round and smiling and framed by small feather-like strands of blonde hair, an angel in a terrible disguise."Why'd you got a mark on your wrist? Father said you gotta tell me 'bout it, not him." he measures, looking shyly away from the too warm eyes of his mother, pale marble cheeks turning pink and cherub-like with a heavy dusting of blush.His mother's smile loses a bit of radiance, but she pulls her other sleeve up to reveal to her son the mark. It's red and shaped oddly, looking like a very spindly, tall, and warped castle from a distance, not unlike his father's keep in anyway now that he thinks on it. "It's something that a lot of humans have Adrian. It's a soul-mark. It's something that guides us to that one true someone out there who is destined to be yours as you are their's in return. It helps humans find their soulmate."She leans closer with a conspiratory smile, whispering in her boy's ear, "Want to know a secret?"Adrian nods vigorously. Her smile simply stretches, "Somewhere, you have a soulmate too."





	Now Was That So Hard?

_"Mama?" a small Adrian Tepes inquires, pulling his mothers sleeve, a silent request for her to bend down and gain her attention._

_"Yes, Adrian dear?" She asks, face round and smiling and framed by small feather-like strands of blonde hair, an angel in a terrible disguise._

_"Why'd you got a mark on your wrist? Father said you gotta tell me 'bout it, not him." he measures, looking shyly away from the too warm eyes of his mother, pale marble cheeks turning pink and cherub-like with a heavy dusting of blush._

_His mother's smile loses a bit of radiance, but she pulls her other sleeve up to reveal to her son the mark he spoke of. It's red and shaped oddly, looking like a very spindly, tall, and warped castle from a distance, not unlike his father's keep in anyway now that he thinks on it. "It's something that a lot of humans have Adrian. It's a soul-mark. It's something that guides us to that one true someone out there who is destined to be yours as you are their's in return. It helps humans find their soulmate."_

_She leans closer with a conspiratory smile, whispering in her boy's ear, "Want to know a secret?"_

_Adrian nods vigorously. Her smile simply stretches, "Somewhere, you have a soulmate too."_

A hiss disturbs him, as the cruel blinding electrical light all too quickly brings him out of his healing slumber, so too does it bring back the memories that gnaw at his heart. He floats out of his sleeping confines, not daring to touch the ground, wishing it was a dream, hoping beyond hope that the wound across his chest is just a phantom pain from a nightmare, and that the last memories of his loving beautiful virtuous mother are nothing but the aftermath of a night terror he had so often been plagued with when he was small enough to curl into her bosom without the inconvenience of his staggering height. But he knows that there is no hope off her here.

He recognizes the secret keep he holed himself in to recuperate from his father's wrath. Hears the whirring of machinery keeping the given blood he had collected flowing to his sleeping confines. Of the traps he laid forth. He can't quite remember why he made all of those traps, which could so easily be dismantled by a vampire it was a scoff, an offense, child's play to disarm and destroy. The scent of fresh blood drudges up those last few memories, it was to keep humans out. The same humans that murdered his mother on false accusations of witch craft. The same humans she died pleading for mercy for. The same humans who were probably thoroughly slaughtered right now and should have been rotting outside and not breathing in the same air as he.

"Why are you here?" He murmurs, head bowed, one arm still grudgingly crossed over his father's work. There are only two, just as the prophecy foretold. Two intruding, impudent humans who dare wake him from his desire to sleep the pain away, the pain of losing the human woman who's kindness was wrenched from this world by humans no different from these two standing before him. Humans, the species his mother's dying wish was for no harm to come to.

"The story- the Messiah sleeps under Gresit! The man who will save us from Dracula." A young woman's voice, probably in her early twenties if not younger, the smell of herbs and indigo dye. A nice enough scent, a nice enough voice, a bit of an accent that was pleasant to the ears if you liked that sort of thing. Ah, he recognized it now. _A Speaker._

An increasing amount of adrenaline pulses in the air, the stench of sewer, and demon bile, and an undertone of stale ale that can only be that powerfully off putting if it was someone who is a regular drunkard. But the scent of smoke startles Adrian for a moment. The whiff of burning wood and salt on his cheek from years past. This human knew pain. _A true Drunkard's motive, if ever there is one._

"And you? Are you in search of a mythical savior?" Adrian asks, this human has him curious if not the littlest bit disgusted by his odor and wanting his hide to stop stifling the air he breaths with such rancid poison.

He almost mistakes a scoff for an amused huff, if not for the hairs standing up on the back of his neck, " _I_ fell down a hole." The voice is masculine, strong, and young, but not so young as the girl's, or ... it's been aged with experience. Not unlikely if his Father's gotten his hellish wish. But this boy, no, this man is dangerous. If he has that much demon ichor on him, he's felled a few of his father's nighthorde, not something just any typical human can accomplish and survive from.

"Dracula is abroad in the land. He has an army of monsters. He's determined to wipe out all human life, wherever he finds it." the girl prattles on, Adrian dismisses her as anything to truly regard at this point. His focus solely resting on the male stranger who's drop of sweat is sliding down from his forehead in restraint. Body heated and tense as a spring coil. 

"Is that what _you_ believe?" Adrian nods towards the man who's barely given him a sentence.

"That Dracula's released his horde on Wallachia?" he asks, his question not even answered. Adrian grits his teeth, "That's fact. There's no 'belief' involved."

"But that's not what you're asking, is it?" Adrian's pulse picks up. _This human, is toying with me. Does he know about a vampire's question? Does he know?_

"No" Adrian replies, trying to speed things along, getting cut off before he can continue to repeat the question.

"You're asking if I believe you're some _sleeping_ Messiah who'll save us, and no, I don't." The man answers, Adrian smells the doubt though. The man has still not answered a single question he's asked with a truthful answer. Which has him itching with curiosity as to what he truly believes. But at this point it's trying even his patience. And he was never really known as a patient being.

"Belmont-" That name strikes him full in the face. _Ah, so that's why. This girl might actually have some merit after all._

"I know what you are." _Belmont_ answers, a name that every being that has ever skulked in the dark and made a bump in the night knows. Because Belmont's make those bumps into bloody screams if the victim is dumb enough to run into one.

Though he knows the man cannot answer this one truthfully, because he cannot possibly know the true answer. He still cannot help but to ask, to see how this human will react to being toyed with in return. A smile asks the man a question with pointed teeth that gleam pearly white in the unnatural light, "And what am I?"

"A Vampire." Adrian's smile turns into a full on smirk, eyes opening and staring into the depths of icy frigid blue, though the temperature seems to be on the opposite side of the spectrum with such a heated gaze staring back. He tries to pay no mind to the girl's gasp but even he can't help but find her reaction a bit amusing if not the least bit typical.

"So I have to ask myself, have we down here to wake up the man who'll _kill_ Dracula... or did we come here to _wake_ Dracula?" Adrian forces down his growing smirk. _If only someone could fall down a hole and stumble upon my Father's sleeping chamber. It'd be my greatest wish to be there to see his expression._

"You call me Dracula..." Adrian tries not to laugh as he says it aloud, it's the most absurd thing he's ever been called. And he had been called many things, many deplorable things among humans and vampires alike, but never has he been mistaken for his father. Granted, no human had ever laid eyes on him and lived, only one such human did and lived to tell the tale... only to be brutally murdered by her own kind. So, in a way, this man was reasonably smart given the false facts he knew, and Adrian could honestly see the connections this _Belmont_ had drawn.

"I'll call you anything you like if you're gonna show me your teeth." Adrian resist the sudden urge to shake his head at this man, the gal this Belmont is putting forth in the face of, who he believes, is Dracula, is astounding. The man was brave, but Adrian can practically feel the man's pulse jumping when he descends to the ground a few feet in front of him.

Adrian gestures to the girl, a question on his mind, a question begets a question, "She called you Belmont. House of Belmont?"

"Trevor Belmont, Last son of the House of Belmont." Adrian senses the truth in the man's name but the rest is an unknown lie, pity wells in him but he stomps it down rather swiftly. Still not a proper truthful answer. And at this point it's grating on his nerves more than the presence of humans being in his personal chambers. _What, do I have to ask him if his eyes are blue or something like that? No, this _Trevor_ Belmont would straight up lie just to get a rise out of me... perhaps..._

"The Belmonts fought creatures of the night, did they not? For Generations." Adrian questions, poker-face up and at it's best. 

"Say what you mean." Trevor steps forward, Adrian was not expecting that, the man continues walking around him a bit off to his left, the eye of a predator circling it's prey. A look he is use to giving rather than being on the receiving end and not greatly fond of it. 

"The Belmonts killed vampires." Adrian supplies, frustration rising at this mans facade of flippancy and innocence, at the killer oh so obviously lurking beneath a slowly revealing itself through his mannerisms.

"Until the good people decided they didn't want us around." Adrian is near his wits end, for this was another answer given that wasn't a true answer, unknowingly or not. Because there's no physical way every good person in the world wanted them gone. If he were guessing right, if the Belmont replaced good with bad, he'd be a lot closer to the true answer than what his first answer was.

"And now Dracula is carrying out an execution order on the human race." Trevor states, Adrien feels a snarl of aggravation bubbling up but he softly swallows it down, careful not to make his adams-apple bob. _Perhaps an opinion._

"Do you care, Belmont?" Adrian turns, face following the young Hunter eyeing him as a lion would a tiger trespassing in his territory.

"Honestly, I didn't, no." Adrian breathes in and out very slowly. _Nothing about that answer is honest you liar._

"But now? Yes, it's time to stop it." Though this rings true as an undeniable truth, it's been tainted with the blatant lie from the beginning of the answer.

Adrian's intrigue flares again, a question out before he can even process what he's just asked, "Do you think you can?" 

"What I think..." Adrian breathes in, he can feel it, a truthful answer on his tongue.

Trevor's hand grasps the whip tied to his waist, "Is that I'm going to have to kill you." Adrian is fed up at this point. 

"Belmont, no! He's the one we've been waiting for!" The girl yells, another fray to add onto Adrian's nerves.

"No, he's not." The Belmont sneers, "He's a vampire. And he's not been waiting here for hundreds of years. Have you?" The last part a rhetorical question if ever he was asked one. and among the snidest too.

"I don't like your _tone_ Belmont." Adrian reprimands. He had been nothing but civil with this human, yet he dare use that kind of voice with him?

"This place _is_ old... but it's not been abandoned. It's alive and working." The unsaid _it wouldn't be if you were here for centuries_ ringing crystal clear. "So go on, _Vampire_. Tell her exactly how long you've been waiting down here." Adrian is loath to follow commands, let alone for this tiring man, but he will answer him this, simply because he is curious himself as to how long it has been since he was last awake in this dreaded world.

"What is the year of your lord?" He asks the _cooperative_ human that isn't trying to get under his skin with words as if it were a stake near his heart.

"1476." She replies, simple and honest. Adrian feels the need to turn around and say " _SEE_? Now was that so hard? Just because her answer to me is not _MY_ answer does not mean I'm going to slaughter you. Although at this point I might simply murder you in cold blood for being so infuriatingly difficult!" in the young tragic Belmont's face. Whatever emotion close to pity he had for him died when Trevor started mincing words and being completely meddlesome and petty.

"Perhaps a year then." He says instead, seething on the inside for how smoothly the deed was done.

"There," Belmont proclaims, slinging a hand up in the air with such a grand facade of casual dalliance that Adrian just knows this man is being a prick. Trevor stalks back to his spot on Adrian's left side, vying again for a natural blind spot he has no intention of giving the man, however sly he may think he is.

"And on top of that what kind of Messiah creates mechanical death traps to buy himself an uninterrupted death trap, in a stone _coffin_?" He questions, again so blatantly rhetorical and insulting it hurts Adrian's pride in the subtleties of the English language. The self-proclaimed last son of the house of Belmont is pacing now, an amateur tactic to keep attention away from movement in that one specific spot Adrian knows he is gunning for.

"My defenses were not for you." Adrian almost sighs, a headache coming on rather quickly from the constant accusations this man has waltzed in here and started throwing at him.

"You could have told your defenses that." He quips back. Adrian is seconds away from baring his fangs at this complete ass and showing him the way out of his secret keep and washing his hands of a Belmont if not in life then in death if need be.

"They are machines, nothing more. They were not intended to protect me from you." Adrian breaths. _Trevor's been doing his amount of interrogation, now it's only fair that he answers a question._ "I asked you a question-do you care?"

The human's hand is back on the whip, but he's hesitant, "I care about doing my family's work. I care about saving human lives." Trevor had found a way to skirt around the blasted question again. Adrian's hands itched to be wrapped around the man's neck and strangling him with enough strength to break his neck. 

"Am I going to have to kill you?" 

_I should be the on asking you that you irksome tiring fool!_

"Do you think you can?" Adrian shoots back, pupils growing smaller and smaller. _It's time for a taste of your own medicine boy._ "If you're really a Belmont and not some runt running around with a family crest, you might be able to." Adrian twitches a finger on his right hand, out of the line of sight of this unnerving man, willingly poking and prodding and withholding the basic manners he knows the hunter is withholding from performing. Summoning his sword from his sleeping confines like a master does his dog. 

"Let's find out!" Adrian glares, slicing the air with the lengthiest piece of silver either of these humans have likely laid eyes on. 

"Belmont, you can't do this!" The girl, Adrian doesn't dare get distracted by. Her demands being ignored completely at this point. 

"Tell that to your floating vampire Jesus here." Trevor declines to heed, untying his whip from his waist in a crouch. 

"You've got nothing but insults, have you?" Adrian asks, a _correctly_ said rhetoric question that he feels he mustn't rub in the human's face, for fear of lowering to his level. But he gently floats towards the man, feral instincts rearing to just go for the man's jugular. _But where's the fun in that?_

"A tired little-" ** _CRACK_**

Adrian's naval stings something fierce, near the same level of pain as his father had dealt him in that one blow. Adrian can't help but release a low growl, he twists himself in the air and lands in a skidding crouch, shoes finally catching some friction on the floor. 

The whip had landed a perfect hit on his belly button. It wasn't a warning of what was to come, this man... was showing off. And oh if that didn't make his cold blood boil. Trevor recoiled his whip and then cracked it at him once more, "Shut the Fuck Up." 

Adrian dodged the versatile weapon, it was staggering how close the man always is with each strike, the more he takes aim, the closer he gets to pale skin with that infernal weapon that smells something like holy water. Adrian blocks and parries a blow that almost licked his side.

"You can't do this, Belmont!" The girl implores, the same words, just arranged differently. But oh it doesn't surprise Adrian in slightest when the man answers nonetheless.

"He's not your Messiah. Dracula's castle can appear anywhere, Sypha." Belmont, as Adrian can only grudgingly admit he is at this point with this level of technique with that whip, is moving faster now, the whip a blur of movement, intricate and ever shifting, "And I told you, _this_ is what it looks like on the inside. And do you know what Dracula looks like?" Trevor doesn't give time for an answer, instead, seizes it for himself as Adrian blocks another crack at his face and cartwheels over another one meant to tangle his ankles together, "Nobody knows what Dracula looks like. You've got _fangs_ , and you _sleep_ in a _coffin_."

Adrian sees an opening, feels the air off the damn blessed tail fly past him, centimeters from his face. Adrian rolls and brandishes his sword, prepared for the attack that comes faithfully the next second. He jumps out of it's path. And the man... _smirks_ Trevor does an unusual trick. Using a finger to pull the whip, feet away from him, directly to him with a trained and rather sneaky move if Adrian's being honest.

This man has all the techniques of a Belmont, however infantile. But he's not keeping to their code of honor at all, or restricting himself to it as his ancestors had. The lash to his side sends him a good few feet away. Adrian grits his teeth as he lays and stalls for a moment, attempting to appear winded. When the hit comes, and oh is he unpleased the man is so crude as to hit a creature while it's down. He brings his sword up, watching as the whip coils around it. _If you're going to fight dirty with that whip, then I'll just take it away._

Adrian pulls, Trevor gives a surprised grunt for his efforts and Adrian smirks, yanking it the other way and sending the mortal flying towards him. A brief show of startlement envelopes Adrian's face, seeing the whip fall limp. The Belmont had abandoned it, instead going for the short sword on his side. The obvious disadvantages, to that choice of weapon against him, did not go unseen. _He'll use his throwing knives as well soon._ He tosses the dead whip away, as he parries the blows directed towards his heart with each and every stroke of the man's sword. But Trevor's sword play is under par compared to his ability with the whip, Adrian would have to be blind to not see that.

Adrian's curiosity is dwindling, he uses a skill he very rarely uses to try and end things quickly. Afterimages of himself following behind as he slips through time. It was suppose to be easy. A slash to the front and he would be dead. But the Belmont seems to be familiar with this trick and blocks the blow.

The human scrambles up onto his dais, Adrian tries again while Trevor is distracted in getting his feet up, but a crippling slash to the back is met with iron. Cold steely eyes seeth at his soul, an annoying smirk stretching in nervousness. Adrian can feel the adrenaline waning as he swivels the block away. He aims for the man's head, but the Belmont evades two attacks, crouches, and springs. Coming at his chest with the likely intention of adding a perpendicular twin wound to his chest. He blocks it more out of reflex than actual thinking, he pushes his sword, currently at a stalemate, but the man's stance is solid even against his own brute strength.

The knee to his crotch does nothing if not aggravate him. He deadpans "Please. This isn't a bar fight, have some class-" a headbutt cuts off what words he would have said if Trevor hadn't made him nearly bite his own tongue off.

Adrian raises a hand and blasts him away. He deserved that one, both for the crotch shot and the headbutt which just irritates his growing migraine in progress. Adrian wastes no time in walking to him, the fight is starting to become a bore. Trevor Belmont's blocks are slowing, it's to be expected. A small wound on the man's arm bleeds sweet red nectar. The smell of warm honey mead.

Adrian breaks the small sword without breaking a sweat. Triumph parading through his veins, and then a sting across his chest and a smirk later, he looks down at the wound across his chest. A near perfect match in length and depth as his father's... but it was not dealt with silver. Adrian punches the man straight in the face, blood leaving his nose in an arc as he sails through the air. This Belmont was durable he'd give him that. The anger taking over and before he can blink back into control he's on the man, has a hand wrenching his head up by the hair, and he's getting a disgusting nose full of alcohol breath straight to the face.

"Do you have a god to put a last prayer to Belmont?" Adrian asks. Fangs out, stomach becoming greedy with need. He may have been asleep for only a year, but he had been very fickle with his provisions. Taking but the bare minimum from his store of blood as he could, not knowing how long he'd have to wait for two prophesied humans to come knocking down his door.

And then Trevor smiles, a sinful but genuine smile, strained and full of enough smugness to make Adrian want to vomit, "Yeah. Dear God, please don't let the vampire's guts ruin my good tunic."

"What?-" _And there's the knife. I knew he was going to use it. Just... not like this._ One of Trevor's small throwing knives is digging just a few inches into his flesh and drawing blood from the wound. It didn't even bother him at this point that the man's answer was still a lie. An Atheist Belmont, now there was a rare breed of beast.

"I can still rip your throat out." Adrian grunts, another centimeter sinks into his skin as a warning.

"You can, but it won't stop me staking you." Trevor grouses, eyes clear and a victorious smirk still graced across his face like it was made for it. But the lie still holds, Trevor knows the blade must be silver or it won't do anything but slow him down. This man, this Belmont, was bluffing in the face of death. _He knew he lost the moment he lost that whip.Has he completely forgotten the girl? He probably thought they were both dead the moment he saw me floating._

"But you will still die." Adrian amends, eyes softening just a tad bit in understanding. Trevor Belmont, a man who grinned in the face of death and wished to do it as much harm as he could before inevitably passing on. He was determined to go down fighting with his last breath, and at least wound the creature that would slay him in some way.

" _ **But I don't care. Killing you was the point, living through it was just a luxury.**_ " Trevor replies. A truthful answer for once from the liar he was about to kill. The liar he was seconds from ripping his throat out and watching bleed out onto the marble. _But not with that answer._ He'd be damned if he let this human die before he turned 70. Adrian laughs at the sheer comedic tragedy playing out.

It was him. The only reason why he came down to this ancient keep, and slept his days away rather than facing his father to the death, likely his alone rather than the mutual deaths he hoped for. What his mother promised so very long ago.

A sudden intense heat makes the hairs on his neck tingle. The scent of magic heavy and potent in the air. Adrian looks away from Trevor, the moment lost.

"I will incinerate you before your fangs touch that man's throat." _So the girl isn't as defenseless as I believed._

"I thought I was your _legendary_ savior." Adrian responds, eyebrow arched. Trevor looks disbelieving at the two, he can feel those incredulous blue eyes on him.

"So did I. But _He_ , he saved my life." She-Sypha, admits.

"You're a Speaker-Magician?"Adrian asks, both a little off put that she was trained well enough to hide her powers from even _his_ senses.

"Yes, and his goal is mine. To stand up for the people." Adrian eyes her, he can practically taste the ashy unknown lie on his tongue. _This man does not care for the people as much as you wish to think._

"Good, very good." Adrian answers instead, letting Trevor go and standing tall, he pulls off of the knife with a grunt though. His wounds already healing. "A vampire hunter and a magician. You'll do." The scrunching of eyebrows, making those blue eyes confused make a small shiver crawl up his spine.

"I am Adrian Tepes. Known to the Wallachians as Alucard... son of Vlad Dracula Tepes. I've been asleep here in my private keep under Gresit for a year. To heal the wound dealt by my Father when I attempted to stop him from unleashing his demon armies."

The fireball instantly disappears, "You are the sleeping soldier."

"I'm aware of the stories. I'm also aware the Speakers consider the story to be information from the future." He admits, turning to address her, a small smile, hiding sharp teeth behind his lips, "Do you know the whole story?"

The sudden rise in heart rate and the blood flooding her cheeks is all the answer he truly needs. If only a certain Belmont could be so truthful and pure. A hesitant "Yes." makes him want to snicker. How flustered Speakers would get when they prophesied _that_ would always tickle him.

Adrian locks gazes with Trevor, who has been sitting rather quiet and politely thus far, a question on his face that he knows _he_ should answer. "The Sleeping Soldier will be met by a Hunter... and a scholar."

He looks disgruntled by this, "No one told me that." exaggerated Betrayal and hurt portrayed in his voice.

"Why do you think my Grandfather tried everything to make you stay?" Sypha interjects, a trace of smugness hidden in there that few men could ever detect.

"I hate Speakers." Trevor grumbles, reluctantly standing to gather his weapons, one less pointy object he could use. Adrian goes back to his sleeping confine to gather his things. His coat and the scabbard of his sword. A sword so long he can't physically sheath it himself, he has to use his own magic to do that.

"So what happens now?" she asks. Eyes following the Belmont as he trudges over to the discarded whip.

"I need a Hunter and a Scholar. We need help to save Wallachia-... perhaps the world... and defeat my father." Adrian answers grim as a grave and walking down the stairs. 

"Why?" Adrian halts, that voice doing things to him he could not begin putting them to words, "Because it is what my Mother would have wanted." His eyes never leave the man as he wraps the whip up, "And we are all, in the end... slaves to our families wishes."

"So you'll help us kill Dracula and save Wallachia?" Trevor asks, standing when Adrian is in front of him, he pauses. There is no sign of conflict in Adrian's yellow eyes.

"My Father has to die." Adrian looks at them both now, "We three... we can destroy him."


End file.
